An armed confrontation, possibly between rival internal groups of the La Familia Michoacana cartel, ended Wednesday with eight people dead — all civilians — in the municipality of Tuzantla, Michoacán.
The figure was confirmed by the Ministry of Public Security and the state Attorney General’s Office, after a series of shootings.
Reports indicate that on Wednesday afternoon an armed group entered that municipality in the Eastern Region of the state, to perpetrate an offensive against a rival cell.
The convoy was met with gunfire in the community of La Yerbabuena and the confrontation extended to the municipal capital, where eight people were killed in the main square.
In the conflict zone, authorities secured four abandoned vans related to the events, one of which was burned.
Read: Michoacán: Authorities arrest 167 members of the criminal group Pueblos Unidos
Intelligence areas report that everything was the result of the rupture and conflict between two internal groups of the La Familia Michoacana cartel.
At the scene, the Secretary of Public Security, José Alfredo Reyes Ortega, led the deployment of elements of the three orders of government and confirmed the number of dead.
The state official indicated that, after the acts of violence, the authorities will reinforce security with surveillance and the installation of a barracks in the community of Melchor Ocampo.
This, he said, because of an operation strategy and because it is one of the parts of Michoacán where criminal cells from the State of Mexico enter.
Ortega Reyes announced that the operation of the Civil Guard, National Guard and Mexican Army will continue in that area of the Eastern Region of the entity.
From January to July, Michoacán registered one thousand 587 intentional homicides and 16 femicides, which makes it one of the most violent states in the country, according to figures from the Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System (SESNSP).
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